


Marshal Massani

by mattsd454



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: One Shot Collection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-09
Updated: 2016-03-09
Packaged: 2018-05-25 19:07:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6206962
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mattsd454/pseuds/mattsd454
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An AU story where Zaeed and Samara's stories are flipped. Alliance Marshal Zaeed Massani is the only law some of the outer colonies will ever know. He spent years tracking down his sadistic son Vido. With Shepard's help, he's found him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Marshal Massani

“Why don’t you join me?”

Outside, Shepard hoped Marshal Massani had the hot-wiring skills he said he had to get him into the apartment. Unarmed and alone, her chances weren’t as good as she liked. 

As she sat down on Vido’s couch, Shepard gave him the same tender distance she would give a mako shark when scuba diving. Deadly, relentless, the shark could tear her apart in seconds. The difference was that the shark saw her as a meal, and Massani saw her as... well, maybe they weren’t that different after all.

“I love clubs. The bass. The heat.” Massani’s eyes shone. The timbre of his voice took on a passionate hush as he said, “It’s like a giant frenzy, ready to be unleashed.” The shine in his eyes softened. A grin played around the edges of his mouth. “Here, it feels safe. Is that what you what, Shepard? To be safe?”

Shepard had to admit, Massani had a vicious, hypnotic charm about him. She enjoyed clubs, and the wild dance of battle, for the same reasons. Had he read her that well? Were they that alike? Or maybe Massani had the charisma of a demon. Shepard knew why she was here. She gazed through him and saw the chuckling monster underneath that waited to feed. 

Shepard played along, “Safety’s a lie,” she said, soft as tiger’s fur. “We’re all predators, or prey. Some of us are both.” She grinned, thinking that suited Massani perfectly. She let him see it. He would think that he had her fooled. 

“Death is our lover. I think that’s something we share. Don’t you?” He leaned close to her. 

Shepard’s disgust rose up from her belly like bile. She was sick of this game. She also noticed that Vido’s left hand never strayed from the edge of the couch. A concealed weapon? 

“We’ve both seen more than our share of death, but death and I have agreed not to like each other. Just like I don’t like you.”

“What the hell is that supposed—”

She heard the hiss, smelled burning wires, then the mechanism of the apartment’s door opening. 

“Son of a bitch!”

Vido went for a gun. Shepard would have snapped his wrist but she heard the safeties on the marshal’s rifle click off. She’d already seen him in action—shoot first, apologize later—and she dove over the couch. 

Marshal Massani’s concussive shot took Vido full in the chest, throwing him back against the living room window and cracking the glass. A black and red-painted M5 pistol landed near Shepard. Two, actually—she had double vision. Shepard’s left ear was ringing. Her right ear couldn’t hear. A thin stream of blood ran from her ear down her neck. Unarmored, the concussive blast had knocked her senseless. Shepard reached for the gun her hand slapped the floor.

Vido chuckled as he stood up. “Hello... dad...”

“Don’t call me that, you son of bitch,” Massani growled.

Vido laughed. “I know I’m not what the great lawman had in mind, but I’ll always be your son!” 

Shepard found the M5.

“It’s over, Vido!” Massani growled. He fired another concussive shot. This time Vido was ready. As the window blew out, he dove to his right, chased by a spray of automatic fire. He punched a hole in the tile floor with his elbow on the way down. Stinking wind gushed into the apartment. 

Vido threw a grenade at Zaeed’s face. He laughed, “You said it, old man.”

“Get down!” Zaeed screamed. He slapped the grenade away, half-turned as it went off. Shepard was already flat on the ground and behind the knocked-over couch. The explosion blew Zaeed off his feet. He slammed into the sculpture in the next room. 

Shepard, Vido, and, miraculously Zaeed all came to their feet at the same time: Shepard with the M5, Zaeed with his Mattock, and Vido with some alien pistol he’s kept in another hide behind the sword he’d hung on the wall. Zaeed looked like death had come for a visit. He coughed and small cuts and burns covered his face, but his rifle didn’t move an inch. The acetylene torch light of his eyes was enough to give you nightmares. 

Vido hesitated when he saw Shepard’s gun. 

Zaeed recited, “Vido Massani, for the charges of murder, slavery, and dozens of other fucking charges I won’t bother to list because we’ll be here all goddamned night—”

“Spare me, you... arrogant... asshole!”

Damaged by the grenade, Zaeed’s rifle jammed. The marshal grit his teeth. Blood dripped off his face like tears, but Zaeed looked like nothing but an enraged spirit ready to meet his death. 

Vido laughed. He aimed his gun at his father’s head, then with deadly calm, Shepard said, “Don’t move, kid.”

Shepard felt his oily charm ooze out of him again, mixing with the smoky, sulfur stench of Omega from the window. “We can make a deal, Shepard,” he purred. “I’m twice the hunter he is. If you’ve gotten this far, you know exactly what I’m capable of.”

“You’re right.”

Shepard’s shot took Vido in the left temple. He staggered back against the wall, crumpling as his legs lost all strength. He must have had some kind of fiber weave or implant in his skull to protect him. Zaeed nodded to her. He tossed his rifle on the floor, then drew his pistol.

Vido scuttled away, crablike, but had nowhere to go. Shepard realized that the shot she gave Vido and the scar on Zaeed’s face were mirrors of each other.

Massani stood over his son. Still as stone, cold as death, Shepard trembled at the idea that this was what judgment looked like. 

Zaeed said, “Your sentence is death.” 

Shepard twisted away as the marshal’s pistol went off. It drowned out the sound of impact. Zaeed fired twice more. He stood a step behind Shepard as he holstered the weapon. “One for him. One for me. One for Nef. And I needed to make sure I got past whatever the hell he’s armored-up his skull with.”

Shepard nodded. She glanced at the body. “You want to talk about it?”

“Fuck no. Maybe over ryncol, some other day.”

“Justice is an ugly business,” Shepard said.

“That’s why it’s blind,” Zaeed replied.


End file.
